The Historical Database defines terms, events and eras in the progress of Chinese and relative East Asian history.

Chinese names will be alphabetically sorted according to Pinyin romanization of the Chinese name (they will appear without the pinyin accent marks). Older pronunciations, former romanizations, other translations and variations will be present next to the pinyin translation. There may be more than a few exceptions to this general rule, depending on the names most commonly associated with the person, independent of romanization issues, such as Chiang Kai-shek.

Where possible, names will include Chinese character references in either traditional (BIG5) or simplified (GB) characters or both.

Please follow this primer which defines the transliteration type and/or name type for entries:

B5- Traditional characters (BIG 5)

GB- Simplified characters (GB)

Should both BIG5 and GB correspond, the character will be listed under B5.

BN- Birth name

CCN- Common name inside China

CN- Common name

TW- Taiwanese

POJ- Orthography for the Taiwanese language

PY- Pinyin romanization

WG- Wade Giles romanization

Y- Yale romanization

Western names will be alphabetically sorted according to western biographical standards, or by surname. If there is a Chinese equivalent, it will be present next to the western name.

Dates reflecting a time period before the year '0' in western terms, are categorized as BCE (Before the Common Era). This is equivalent to the widely used BC (Before Christ) and a.C.n. (Ante Christum Natum "before the birth of Christ"). Dates reflecting a time period after the year '0' are categorized as CE (in the Common Era). This is equivalent to the widely used AD (Anno Domini "In the Year of the Lord"). As the Chinese culture in the majority do not subscribe to the practice of Christianity as a religion, it seemed appropriate to signify these dates in a neutral manner.

Dates before October 1582 are given in the Julian calendar, not in the proleptic Gregorian calendar. Dates after October 1582 are given in the Gregorian calendar, not in the Julian calendar that remained in use in England until 1752.

An index to all terms in this database is located after the database entries.

Beiyang Army, TheB5: 北洋軍; PY: běiyáng jūn- Powerful and Western-appearing Chinese military force created by the Qing dynasty government in the late 19th century. It was the centerpiece of a general reconstruction of China's military system. The Beiyang Army played a major role in Chinese politics for at least three decades and arguably right up to 1949. It made the 1911 revolution possible, and by dividing into warlord factions (北洋軍閥 běiyáng jūnfá) ushered in a period of regional division.

The Beiyang Army was created from Li Hongzhang's Anhui Army, which first saw action during the Taiping Rebellion. Unlike the traditional Green Standard or Banner forces of the Qing, the Anhui Army was largely a militia army based on personal, rather than institutional, loyalties. The Anhui Army was at first equipped with a mixture of traditional and modern weapons. Its creator, Li Hongzhang, used the customs and tax revenues of the five provinces under his control in the 1880s and 1890s to modernize segments of the Anhui Army, and to build a modern navy (the Beiyang Fleet). It is around this time that the term "Beiyang Army" began to be used to refer to the military forces under his control. The term "Beiyang", meaning literally "Northern Ocean", refers to the customs revenues collected in North China, which were used first to fund the Beiyang Fleet and later the Beiyang Army. Unfortunately, funding was usually irregular and training by no means systematic.By the mid-1890s the Beiyang Army was the best regionalist troops China could field. The Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895) was fought almost entirely by the Beiyang Army, unsupported by the forces of other provinces. In the war the Beiyang Fleet, which included two pre-Dreadnought battleships, was overwhelmed by the well-served quick-firing guns of a lighter Japanese fleet. On land similarly Japan's German-inspired conscript army, led by academy-trained professional officers, defeated the Beiyang Army.

Li Hongzhang died in 1901 and was replaced by Yuan Shikai, who took on Li's appointment as Governor-General of Zhili and as Superintendent of Trade for the Northern Ocean (北洋大臣). Yuan had been given command in 1895 of the brigade-sized New Created Army. Many of his officers later became leading figures of the warlord period. They included Zhang Xun (who attempted to restore the Qing dynasty in 1917), Xu Shichang (President of the Republic of China 1918-22), Cao Kun (President 1922-24 and leader of the Zhili military clique), Duan Qirui ("Prime Minister" during much of 1916-20 and leader of the Anhui military clique) and Feng Guozhang (President 1917-18 and founder of the Zhili clique).Yuan Shikai oversaw the piecemeal reform of Qing military institutions after 1901. He founded the Baoting Military Academy, which allowed him to expand the Beiyang Army. With the creation of the Commission for Army Reorganization in December 1903, the Beiyang Army became the model on which the military forces of other provinces should be standardized. By 1905 Yuan had increased the Beiyang Army to six divisions. In October he held maneuvers near Hejian in central Zhili using the newly completed Beijing-Hankou railway. Similar exercises where held the next year with Zhang Zhidong's army in Hubei. It was the unanimous opinion of foreign observers that the Beiyang Army was the largest, best equipped and best trained military force in China at the time.

The Empress Dowager Cixi died on 15 November 1908 and was succeeded by the three year old Puyi. The new regent, 2nd Prince Chun (醇親王), had Yuan Shikai dismissed the next year. Yuan bided his time in retirement, carefully maintaining his network of personal contacts in the Beiyang Army. At the time of the 1911 Revolution, command of the Beiyang Army was supposedly in the hands of the Manchu minister Yinchang. In reality Yuan Shikai still had the ability to manipulate it due to the loyalties of its officer to him personally. Four divisions were located in Zhili, the 3rd Division being in Manchuria and the 5th Division in Shandong. Almost all the officers were ethnically Chinese, many of whom were returned students from Japan. Armament was not standardized, but was better in that respect than either before or later. Most of the infantry were armed with either the standard 1896 Japanese rifle or the Mauser 7.9mm.

The events of the revolution demonstrated that the Beiyang Army, which formed the core of the 36-division New Army, was absolutely the dominant military force within China. Controlling the fragmented loyalties of its formations was the key to political power in post-1911 China. The insurrection which actually set off the 1911 Revolution took place in Wuchang on 10 October. On 12 October Yinchang was ordered to take two Beiyang Army divisions down the Beijing-Hankou Railway to suppress the uprising at Wuchang. He attacked the revolutionary army commanded by Huang Xing on 27 October.Covered by their own field artillery and the guns of the imperial fleet, the Beiyang infantry attacked with a cloud of skirmishers followed by a line of close order company fronts. These textbook tactics were soon to be discredited in the intense fighting of the First World War, but against an undisciplined revolutionary with no machine guns, they worked perfectly.On the same day Yuan Shikai was ordered to take command of the forces at Wuchang. He refused, instead securing high commands for his two most trusted associates, Feng Guozhang and Duan Qirui. Fighting continued in Hubei for another month as Yuan negotiated with the dynasty and the revolutionaries using the Beiyang Army as weapon of coercion. The end result was that he was elected as provisional President of the Republic of China.

During the period 1911-15 Yuan Shikai remained the only man who could hold the Beiyang Army together. He and his followers strongly resisted any attempt by the Kuomintang (KMT) to insert outsiders into their chain of command. They negotiated a £25 million (sterling) loan from a five-power banking consortium to support the Beiyang Army despite the uproar from the KMT. In 1913 Yuan Shikai appointed four of his loyal lieutenants as military governors in southern provinces: Duan Qirui in Anhui, Feng Guozhang in Jiangsu, Li Shun in Jiangxi and Tang Xiangming in Hunan. The unified Beiyang military clique now attained its maximum extent of territorial control. It exercised firm control over North China and the Yangtze River provinces. Throughout 1914, it supported Yuan in making revisions to the constitution to give himself treaty- and war-making power as well as substantial emergency powers.In December 1915 Yuan declared himself Emperor. This was opposed by almost all the generals and officers of the Beiyang Army, from Duan Qirui and Feng Guozhang down. More importantly, many outlying provinces such as Yunnan openly opposed him. Yuan Shikai was forced to back down from his imperial designs. Both Duan and Feng refused to support Yuan in power any further and in the end the only prominent Beiyang general to remain loyal was the irrepressible Zhang Xun. Yuan died soon afterward. After Yuan Shikai's death the Beiyang Army split into cliques led by Yuan's principal protégés. Duan Qirui's Anhui clique and the Zhili clique founded by Feng Guozhang, but led after Feng's death by Cao Kun and Wu Peifu, were the principal Beiyang cliques. Disunited, the power of the Beiyang Army was challenged by provincial armies such as Yan Xishan's forces in Shaanxi and Zhang Zuolin's Fengtian clique.

Pressure from the Beiyang commanders prevented any political figure of the left from taking up power in the Republic of China government. For almost a decade after Yuan's death, the agenda of the leading Beiyang warlords was to reunify China by first reuniting the Beiyang Army and then conquering the lesser provincial armies.For a period from mid-1916, the ultraconservative Beiyang general Zhang Xun managed to maintain the unity of the army via collegial contacts and negotiation. Like Yuan Shikai had done, the Beiyang generals used their military power to intimidate the parliament into passing the legislation they wanted. Following a dispute with President Li Yuanhong over a loan from Japan in early 1917, Duan Qirui declared independence from the government along with most of the other Beiyang generals. Zhang Xun then occupied Beijing with his army, and on 1 July shocked the Chinese political world by proclaiming the restoration of the Qing dynasty. All the other generals condemned this and the restoration soon collapsed. The elimination of Zhang Xun soon afterwards destroyed the balance of power between the rival factions of Feng and Duan and inaugurated a decade of high warlordism.Feng Guozhang went to Beijing to assume the presidency after securing the appointment of his protégé as military commander in Jiangxi, Hubei and Jiangsu. These three provinces became the bases of strength of the Zhili military clique. Duan Qirui resumed his position of Prime Minister; his Anhui (sometimes called Anfu) clique dominated the Beijing area. Using Japanese funding to build up his so-called "War Participation Army", Duan continued to struggle with Feng Guozhang.Feng was eventually eliminated from political life in 1918, when Xu Shichang, the Beiyang elder statesman, became President. His deputy Cao Kun replaced him as leader of the Zhili clique. At the end of World War I, Duan dominated the Chinese representation at the Treaty of Versailles and used the Shanghai peace conference in 1919 to bring pressure on the non-Beiyang militarists supporting Sun Yat-sen's government in Guangzhou. He continued to receive Japanese funding for his army (renamed "National Defence Army"), for which he was willing to grant Japan legal succession to the German rights in Shandong.

Before May-June 1919, some combination of fighting and negotiation among the major Beiyang leader was expected to lead to military unification, which in turn would permit the restoration of the constitutional political processes that Yuan Shikai had disrupted. By 1919 the three major northern military factions had cemented, two of them - Anhui and Zhili - directly from the Beiyang Army and the third - Fengtian, under Zhang Zuolin - from an amalgamation of Beiyang and local troops. They and their imitators on a smaller scale were willing to get money and arms from any source in order to survive and the weaker factions would combine against the stronger.The history of the major warlord wars down to 1925 recount the failure of any of the military commanders in China to centralize political and military power to any degree. In a situation resembling the period of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, most of South China remained beyond Beiyang control, to become the incubator for both the KMT and Communist Party of China movements.

KuomindangB5: 中國國民黨; GB: 中国国民党; PY: Zhōngguó Guómíndǎng; WG: Chung-kuo Kuo-min-tang; Also: Tongyong- The Chinese Nationalist Party, commonly known as the Kuomintang (KMT), is a conservative political party currently active in the Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan. Together with the People First Party, it forms what is known as the pan-blue coalition, which leans towards Chinese reunification whereas the pan-green coalition leans towards Taiwan independence.Organized shortly after the Xinhai Revolution, which overthrew the Qing Dynasty in China, the KMT fought the Beiyang warlords and the Communist Party of China for control of the country before its retreat to Taiwan in 1949. There, it controlled the government under a one-party authoritarian state until reforms in the late 1970s through the 1990s loosened its grip on power. The ROC was once referred to synonymously with the KMT and known simply as "Nationalist China" after its ruling party.The KMT in Taiwan became the world's richest political party, with assets once valued to be around US$ 2.6-10 billion. These assets have begun to be liquidated since 2000.

Support for the KMT on Taiwan encompasses a wide range of groups. KMT support tends to be higher in northern Taiwan, where it draws its backing primarily from business interests, Mainlanders, Hakka, and aboriginals. Business interests and persons, especially in Taipei, tend to agree with the KMT's pro-business ideology, who seek, among other issues, to better relations with the mainland. In rural areas, support for the KMT comes largely as a result of patronage and social networks, in which supporters of the KMT view as working for the people. Critics tend to view this as a form of corruption that benefits only a select group of people. KMT also has strong support in the labor sector because of the many labor benefits and insurances implemented when it was in power. KMT traditionally has strong cooperations with labor unions too.The flag of the Kuomintang consists of a twelve ray sun (originating from the twelve traditional Chinese hours of the day) to symbolize the spirit of progress. The flag forms the basis of the canton of the flag of the Republic of China.Opponents of the KMT include strong supporters of Taiwan independence. There also is opposition due to an image of KMT both as a Mainlander's and urban party out of touch with rural life. In addition, many oppose the KMT on the basis of its authoritarian past, such as the 228 Incident and the reign of White Terror.The party is a member of the International Democrat Union.

The Kuomintang was originally founded in Guangdong Province on August 25, 1912 from a collection of several revolutionary groups, including the Revolutionary Alliance, as a moderate democratic socialist party and Anarchists active in the Student movement. The party traces its roots to the Revive China Society, which was founded in 1895 and merged with several other anti-monarchist societies as the Revolutionary Alliance in 1905. Sun Yat-sen, who had just stepped down as provisional president of the Republic of China, was chosen as its overall leader under the title of premier (總理), and Huang Xing was chosen as Sun's deputy. However, the most influential member of the party was the third ranking Sung Chiao-jen, who mobilized mass support from gentry and merchants for the KMT in winning the 1912 National Assembly election, on a platform of promoting constitutional parliamentary democracy. Though the party had an overwhelming majority in the first National Assembly, President Yuan Shikai started ignoring the parliamentary body in making presidential decisions, counter to the Constitution, and assassinated its parliamentary leader Sung Chiao-jen in Shanghai in 1913. Members of the KMT led by Sun Yat-sen staged the Second Revolution in July 1913, a poorly planned and ill-supported armed rising to overthrow Yuan, and failed. Yuan dissolved the KMT in November (whose members had largely fled into exile in Japan) and dismissed the parliament early in 1914.While exiled in Japan in 1914, Sun established the Chinese Revolutionary Party, but many of his old revolutionary comrades, including Huang Xing, Wang Jingwei, and Chen Jiongming, refused to join him or support his efforts in inciting armed uprising against the Beijing government, and Sun was largely sidelined within the Republican movement during this period. Sun returned to China in 1917 to establish a rival government at Guangzhou, but was soon forced out of office and exiled to Shanghai. There, with renewed support, he resurrected the KMT on October 10, 1919, but under the name of the Chinese Kuomintang (the old party had simply been called the Kuomintang). In 1920, Sun and the KMT were restored in Guangdong. In 1923, the KMT and its government accepted aid from the Soviet Union after being denied recognition by the western powers. Soviet advisers -- the most prominent of whom was an agent of the Comintern, Mikhail Borodin -- began to arrive in China in 1923 to aid in the reorganization and consolidation of the KMT along the lines of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, establishing a Leninist party structure that lasted into the 1990s. The Communist Party of China (CPC) was under Comintern instructions to cooperate with the KMT, and its members were encouraged to join while maintaining their separate party identities, forming the First United Front between the two parties. Soviet advisers also helped the Nationalists set up a political institute to train propagandists in mass mobilization techniques, and in 1923 Chiang Kai-shek, one of Sun's lieutenants from the Tongmenghui days, was sent to Moscow for several months' military and political study.At the first party congress in 1924, which included non-KMT delegates such as members of the CPC, they adopted Sun's political theory, which included the Three Principles of the People - nationalism, democracy, and the livelihood of the people.

Following the death of Sun Yat-sen, General Chiang Kai-shek emerged as the KMT leader and launched the Northern Expedition in 1926 against the warlord government in Beijing. He halted briefly in Shanghai in 1927 to purge the Communists who had been allied with the KMT, which sparked the Chinese Civil War. Kuomintang forces took Beijing in 1928 and received widespread diplomatic recognition in the same year. The capital was moved from Beijing to Nanjing, the original capital of the Ming dynasty.Thus began the period of "political tutelage," whereby the party was to control the government while instructing the people on how to participate in a democratic system. After several military campaigns, the Communists were forced (1934-35) to withdraw from their bases in southern and central China. The Kuomintang continued to attack the Communists, even during the Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945).After the defeat of the Japanese, full-scale civil war between the Communists and Nationalists resumed. Chiang Kai-shek ordered his forces to the cities to defend industrialists and financiers, allowing the Communists to move freely through the countryside. By the end of 1949 the Communists controlled almost all of mainland China, as the Kuomintang fled to Taiwan with 2 million refugees along with a hoard of China's national treasures. Some leftists stayed and broke away from the main Kuomintang to found the Revolutionary Committee of the Kuomintang, which still exists (as of 2005) as one of the eight minor registered parties in the People's Republic of China.

In 1950 Chiang took office in Taipei under the Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of Communist Rebellion which halted democratic processes until the mainland could be recovered from the communists. During this time, as a result of the 228 Incident, Taiwanese people had to endure what is called the "White Terror", a KMT-led political repression. The various government organs previously in Nanjing were re-established in Taipei as the KMT-controlled government actively claimed sovereignty over all China. The Republic of China retained China's seat in the United Nations until 1971.In the 1970s, the Kuomintang began to allow for "supplemental elections" on Taiwan to fill the seats of the aging representatives. Although opposition parties were not permitted, Tangwai (or, "outside the party") representatives were tolerated. In the 1980s, the Kuomintang focused on transforming itself from a party of a single-party system to one of many in a multi-party democracy, and on "Taiwanizing" itself. With the founding of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in 1986, the Kuomintang found itself competing against the DPP in Taiwanese elections. Lee Teng-Hui, the ROC President and the leader of the Kuomintang during the 1990s, angered the People's Republic of China and a significant number of voters on Taiwan with his advocacy of "special state-to-state relations" with the PRC, which many associated with Taiwan independence. In order to maintain influence, the Kuomintang was allegedly involved in vote-buying and black gold, which decreased its support among the Taiwanese middle class.The KMT headquarters in Taipei, an imposing structure that directly faces the Presidential Building, was seen as a symbol of the party's wealth and dominance.As the ruling party on Taiwan, the KMT amassed a vast business empire of banks, investment companies, petrochemical firms, and television and radio stations. Its wealth in the year 2000 was at an estimated US $6.5 billion, making it the richest political party in the world. Although this war chest appeared to help the KMT throughout until the mid-1990s, it led to accusations of black gold corruption, and after 2000, the KMT's financial holdings appeared to be far more of a liability than an asset. After 2000, the KMT claims to have divested itself of a large quantity of assets, but because the transactions were not disclosed and because there is no transparency in the spending of campaign funds (no reporting is required), these claims are difficult to verify. There were accusations in the 2004 presidential election that the KMT retained assets that were illegally acquired, and in any case, the KMT retains large properties throughout Taiwan. According to political opponents, most of the KMT's properties used to be governmental public assets belonging to the Japanese ruling government and were not supposed to be transferred to non-governmental entities after the second world war. Currently, there is a law proposed by the DPP in the Legislative Yuan to recover illegally acquired party assets and return them to the government; however, since the pan-Blue alliance, the KMT and its smaller partner PFP, control the legislature, it is very unlikely to be passed. The KMT also acknowledged that part of its assets were acquired through extra-legal means and thus promised to "retro-endow" them to the government. However, the quantity of the assets which should be classified as illegal are still under heated debate; DPP, the current ruling party, claimed that there is much more that the KMT has yet to acknowledge. Also, the KMT actively sold assets under its title in order to quench its recent financial difficulties, which the DPP argues is illegal. Current KMT Chairman Ma Ying-Jiu's position is that the KMT will sell off some of its properties at below market rates rather than return them to the government and that the details of these transactions will not be publicly disclosed.The Kuomintang faced a split in 1994 that led to the formation of the Chinese New Party, alleged to be a result of Lee's "corruptive ruling style". The New Party has, since the purging of Lee, largely reintegrated into KMT. A much more serious split in the party occurred as a result of the 2000 Presidential election. Upset at the choice of Lien Chan as the party's presidential nominee, former party Secretary-General James Soong launched an independent bid, which resulted in the expulsion of Soong and his supporters and the formation of the People's First Party (PFP). The KMT candidate placed third behind Soong in the elections. After the election, Lee's strong relationship with the opponent became apparent. In order to prevent defections to the PFP, Lien moved the party away from Lee's pro-independence policies and became more favorable toward Chinese reunification. This shift led to Lee's expulsion from the party and the formation of the Taiwan Solidarity Union.With the party's voters
defecting to both the PFP and TSU, the KMT did poorly in the December 2001 legislative elections and lost its position as the largest party in the Legislative Yuan. More recently, the party did well in the 2002 mayoral and council election with Ma Ying-jeou, its candidate for Taipei mayor, winning reelection by a landslide and its candidate for Kaohsiung mayor narrowly losing but doing surprisingly well. Since 2002, the KMT and PFP have coordinated electoral strategies. In 2004, the KMT and PFP ran a joint presidential ticket, with Lien running for president and Soong running for vice-president.In December 2003, however, the KMT chairman and presidential candidate, Lien Chan, initiated what appeared to some to be a major shift in the party's position on the linked questions of Chinese reunification and Taiwanese independence. Speaking to foreign journalists, Lien said that while the KMT was opposed to "immediate independence," it did not wish to be classed as "pro-reunificationist" either.At the same time, Wang Jin-pyng, speaker of the Legislative Yuan and the Pan-Blue Coalition's campaign manager in the 2004 presidential election, said that the party no longer opposed Taiwan's "eventual independence." This statement was later clarified as meaning that the KMT opposes any immediate decision on unification and independence and would like to have this issue resolved by future generations. The KMT's position on the cross-strait relationship was redefined as hoping to remain in the current neither-independent-nor-united situation.There has been a recent warming of relations between the pan-blue coalition and the PRC, with prominent members of both the KMT and PFP in active discussions with officials on the Mainland. In February 2004, it appeared that KMT had opened a campaign office for the Lien-Soong ticket in Shanghai targeting Taiwanese businessmen. However, after an adverse reaction in Taiwan, the KMT quickly declared that the office was opened without official knowledge or authorization. In addition, the PRC issued a statement forbidding open campaigning in the Mainland and formally stated that it had no preference as to which candidate won and cared only about the positions of the winning candidate.The loss of the presidential election of 2004 to DPP President Chen Shui-bian by merely over 30000 votes was a bitter disappointment to party members, leading to a few rallies for a few weeks protesting alleged electoral fraud and the "odd circumstances" of the shooting of President Chen. However, the fortunes of the party were greatly improved when the KMT did well in the legislative elections held in December 2004 by maintaining its support in southern Taiwan achieving a majority for the pan-blue coalition. Soon after the election, there appeared to be a falling out with the KMT's junior partner with the coalition the People's First Party and talk of a merger seemed to have ended. This split appeared to widen in early 2005, as the leader of the PFP, James Soong appeared to be reconciling with President Chen Shui-Bian and the Democratic Progressive Party. However, Soong appeared to split with Chen Shui-Bian after Chen attended a protest against the Anti-Secession Law passed by the People's Republic of China.In 2005, Party chairman Lien Chan announced that he was to leave his office. The two leading contenders for the position include Ma Ying-jeou and Wang Jin-pyng. On April 5, 2005, Mayor of Taipei Ma Ying-jeou said he wishes to lead the opposition Kuomintang with Wang Jin-pyng, if he were elected its chairman in an exclusive interview with CTV talk show host Sisy Chen.On March 28, 2005, thirty members of the Kuomintang (KMT), led by KMT vice chairman P. K. Chiang, arrived in mainland China, marking the first official visit by the KMT to the mainland since it was defeated by communist forces in 1949 (although KMT members include Chiang had made individual visits in the past). The delegates began their itinerary by paying homage to the revolutionary martyrs of the Tenth Uprising at Huanghuagang. They subsequently flew to the former ROC capital of Nanjing to commemorate Sun Yat-sen. During the trip KMT signed a 10-points agreement with the CPC. The opponents regarded this visit as the prelude of the third KMT-CPC cooperation. Weeks afterwards, in May, Chairman Lien Chan visited the mainland and met with Hu Jintao. No agreements were signed because Chen Shui-bian's government threatened to prosecute the KMT delegation for violating laws prohibiting citizens from collaborating with Communists.On 16 July 2005 Taipei mayor Ma Ying-jeou was elected as KMT chairman in the first contested leadership in Kuomintang's 93-year history. Some 54 percent of the party's 1.04 million members cast their ballots. Ma Ying-jeou garnered 72.4 percent of vote share, or 375,056 votes, against Wang Jin-pyng's 27.6 percent, or 143,268 votes. After failing to convince Wang to stay on as a vice chairman, Ma named,
as vice chairpersons, holdovers Wu Po-hsiung (吳伯雄), Chiang Pin-kung (江丙坤), and Lin Cheng-chi (林澄枝), as well as long-time party administrator and strategist John Kuan (關中), and the vice chairpersons were approved by hand count of party delegates.The KMT won a decisive victory in the 3-in-1 local elections of December 2005, replacing the DPP as the largest party at the local level. This was seen as a major victory for the party ahead of legislative elections in 2007, and especially for Ma Ying-jeou ahead of the 2008 presidential elections.

May 4th Movement, TheB5: 五四運動; PY: wǔ sì yùn dòng (May 4, 1919)- Anti-imperialist, cultural, and political movement in early modern China. Taking place on May 4, 1919, it marked the upsurge of Chinese nationalism, and a re-evaluation of Chinese cultural institutions, such as Confucianism. The movement grew out of dissatisfaction with the Treaty of Versailles settlement and the effect of the New Cultural Movement.

Following Xinhai Revolution, the Qing Dynasty was overthrown and marked the end of thousands of years of imperial rule and theoretically ushered a new era where political power rested in the people. However, the reality was that China was a fragmented nation dominated by warlords, who were more concerned with their own political powers and the survival of their own private armies, and by foreigners, who had commercial and semi-colonial interests in China. The Chinese Beiyang government was preoccupied with suppressing internal dissent and did little to counter the influence exerted by the imperialist foreign powers. The Beiyang government made various concessions to foreigners in order to gain monetary and military support against their rivals. This, together with the tangled warfare among warlords which was still continuing led to great suffering among the population. Furthermore, the development of the New Cultural Movement promoted the questioning and re-appraisal of millennia-old Chinese values. In addition, defeats against foreign powers and the presence of spheres of influence only inflamed more sense of nationalism among the Chinese people, particularly in students. These factors were the background which would eventually fuel the May Fourth Movement.

The Beiyang government entered World War I on the side of the Allies in 1917, on the condition that all German spheres of influence, such as Shandong, would be returned to China. However, Japan also entered the war as an Allied power and proceeded to attack German interests in China and annexed German spheres of influence when the war ended. In early 1919, the victorious nations of World War I convened a peace conference in Paris.

The representatives of the Chinese government put forth the following requests:

abolish all imperialist privileges, such as foreigners' immunity in Chinese courts, in China.

cancel the "Twenty-One Demands" with the Japanese

return Chinese territorial integrity of Shandong, which Japan had taken from Germany during World War I.

Britain and the United States dominated the meeting and rejected the Chinese representatives' demands. The failure in diplomacy of China at the Paris Peace Conference became the incident that touched off the outbreak of the May Fourth Movement.On May 4th, over 3000 students of Peking University and other schools gathered together in front of Tiananmen and held a demonstration. They voiced their anger at the Allied betrayal of China and the government's inability to secure Chinese interests in the conference. They shouted out such slogans as "Struggle for the sovereignty externally, get rid of the national traitors at home", "Do away with the 'Twenty-One Demands'", "Don't sign the Versailles Treaty". They demanded punishment to figures as Cao Rulin, Zhang Zongxiang, and Lu Zongyu, who held important posts as diplomats. The enraged students even burnt down Cao Rulin's house. The Beiyang government suppressed the demonstration and arrested many students.The next day, students in Beijing as a whole went on strike, and students in other parts of the country responded one after another.From early June, in order to support the students' struggle, workers and businessmen in Shanghai also went on strike. So did workers in other places one after another. The center of the movement moved from Beijing to Shanghai. In addition to students and intellectuals, the lower class was also very angry at the current state of affairs, such as mistreatment of workers and perpetual poverty of small peasants. Under intense public outcry, the Beiyang government had to release the arrested students and dismiss Cao Rulin, Zhang Zongxiang and Lu Zongyu from their posts. Also, the Chinese representatives in Paris refused to sign on the peace treaty: the May Fourth Movement won the initial victory. However, this move was more symbolic than anything else. It indicated that this would be the last unequal treaty to which the Chinese would submit. However, Japan still retained control of the Shandong Peninsula and the islands in the Pacific it had obtained during the Great War.

The May Fourth Movement is now claimed by the Communist movement that was to gain control of China in 1949 and keep power until today. A sample of this kind of communist interpretation of the May Fourth Movement follows:The May Fourth Movement was a thoroughly an anti-imperialist and anti-feudal revolutionary movement. Young students acted as its pioneers. The Chinese working class went up on the political stage, and functioned as the main force in the later period of the movement. Li Dazhao, Chen Duxiu and other intellectuals directed and promoted the development of the movement, and played leading roles in it. On the local level, future Communist Party leader Mao Zedong rallied opposition against Hunan's warlord Chang Ching-yao.The May Fourth Movement covered more than 20 provinces and over 100 cities of the country. It had a broader popular foundation than the Revolution of 1911. Its great contribution lay in arousing the people's consciousness and preparing for the unity of the revolutionary forces.The May Fourth Movement promoted the spreading of Marxism in China, and prepared the ideological foundation for the establishment of the Communist Party of China. The October Revolution pointed out the direction for the Chinese revolution. The May Fourth Movement, which took place after the October Socialist Revolution, was a part of the world's Proletarian Revolution.The May Fourth Movement marked the beginning of the New Democratic Revolution in China. It also served as a intellectual turning point in China. It was the seminal event that radicalized Chinese intellectual thought. Previously Western style liberal democracy had a degree of traction amongst Chinese intellectuals. However the Versailles Treaty was viewed as a betrayal. Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points, cloaked as they were by moralism, were specifically and Western centrist thought more generally seen as hypocritical and was jettisoned by the Chinese intellectual community. The adoption of Marxist Leninism began to take hold on the left. It was during this time that communism was studied seriously by some Chinese intellectuals such as Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao.

In 1984, Deng Xiaoping proposed to apply the principle to Hong Kong in the negotiation talks with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher over the future of Hong Kong when the lease of the New Territories (including New Kowloon) of Hong Kong to Britain was to expire in 1997. The same principle was proposed in the talks with Portugal over Macau.The principle is that upon reunification, despite the practice of socialism in mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau, which were formerly colonies of the United Kingdom and Portugal respectively, can continue to practice capitalism under a high degree of autonomy for fifty years after reunification.The establishment of these regions, called Special Administrative Regions (SARs), is authorized by Article 31 of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, which states that the State may establish SARs when necessary, and that the systems to be instituted in them shall be prescribed by law enacted by the National People's Congress in light of the specific conditions.The SARs of Hong Kong and Macau were formally established on July 1, 1997 and December 20, 1999 respectively, immediately after the People's Republic of China (PRC) resumed the exercise of sovereignty over the respective regions.

The two SARs of Hong Kong and Macau are responsible for their domestic affairs, including, but not limited to, the judiciary and courts of last resort, immigration and customs, public finance, currencies and extradition. Diplomatic relations and national defense of the two SARs are, however, the responsibility of the Central People's Government in Beijing.Hong Kong continues using English common law. Macau continues using the Portuguese civil law system.

In Hong Kong, the system has been implemented through the Basic Law of Hong Kong, which serves as the mini-constitution of the region, and consistent with the Sino-British Joint Declaration. Similar arrangements are in place with Macau.Under the respective basic laws, the SARs have a high degree of autonomy and enjoys executive, legislative and independent judicial power, including that of final adjudication. They formulate their own monetary and financial policies, maintain their own currencies, formulate their own policies on education, culture, sports, social welfare system, etc. within the framework of the basic laws.As stipulated by the basic laws, while the Central People's Government of the PRC is responsible for foreign affairs and defense in relation to the SARs, representatives of the Government of the SARs may participate, as members of delegations of the PRC, in diplomatic negotiations that directly affect the Regions, and in other international organizations or conferences limited to states and affecting the region. For those international organizations and conferences not limited to states, the SARs may participate using the names in the form of "Hong Kong, China". As separate economic entities, both SARs of Hong Kong and Macau are members of the World Trade Organization. Hong Kong is also one of the member economies of APEC.The basic laws also provide constitutional protection on various fundamental human rights and freedoms. Specifically, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is given a constitutional status through the basic laws.Some international observers and human rights organizations have expressed doubts over the future freedom of expressing political opinions, and on the pledge of high degree of autonomy in Hong Kong. They considered, for example, that the proposals on Article 23 of the Basic Law in 2003 (which was withdrawn due to mass opposition) might have undermined freedoms. Some also criticized that Beijing's influence on the democratic developments in Hong Kong could undermine the pledge of a high degree of autonomy.Nonetheless, the governments of the People's Republic of China and Hong Kong both consider that the principle has been successfully implemented, quoting official reports of both the United Kingdom and the United States. Public polls have also shown that among the various areas of governance, the public is most satisfied with the degree of freedoms enjoyed.

This system has also been proposed by the PRC government for Taiwan, but the Republic of China government has refused this offer. (It was also claimed that the system was originally designed for Taiwan.) Special provisions for a Taiwanese military have also been proposed. The concept of "one country, two systems" (or two-states theory) tends to be highly unpopular in Taiwan, with polls consistently showing 80% opposition and only about 10% support. All of the major parties in Taiwan, including those that lean toward Chinese reunification have come out strongly against "one country, two systems." One of the very few Taiwanese who have publicly supported "one country, two systems" is novelist Li Ao.

Pan-Blue Coalition, TheB5: 泛藍聯盟; GB: 泛蓝联盟; PY: Fànlán LiánméngPan-Blue Force, TheB5: 泛藍軍; GB: 泛蓝军; PY: Fànlán Jūn- Political coalition in early 21st century Taiwan, consisting of the Kuomintang (KMT), the People First Party (PFP), and the smaller New Party (CNP). The name comes from the party colors of the Kuomintang. This coalition tends to favor a Chinese nationalist identity over a Taiwanese separatist one and favors a softer policy and greater economic linkage with the People's Republic of China. It is opposed to the Pan-Green Coalition.The Pan-Blue Coalition is originally associated with Chinese reunification, but has moved towards a more conservative position supporting the status quo. The two parties are still staunchly defending the sovereignty of the Republic of China, though not Taiwan. Much of the support and opposition to the coalition has to do with relations with Mainland China, however economics is also an important factor. Support for the coalition among the poor and Aboriginals is high because of widespread dissatisfaction with Pan-Green economic policies that have undone the island's famed "economic miracle."Throughout the 1990s, the Kuomintang consisted of an uneasy relationship between those which supported a Chinese nationalist identity for Taiwan and those, led by President Lee Teng-hui, who supported a stronger Taiwanese separatist identity. This led to a split in the early 1990s, when the New Party was formed. During the 2000 presidential election, Lee Teng-hui arranged for Lien Chan to be nominated as Kuomintang candidate for president rather than the more popular James Soong, who bolted from the party and formed his own People First Party. Many in Taiwan believed that Lee's action was a deliberate attempt to sabotage the Kuomintang to ensure victory for Chen Shui-bian of the DPP.In the 2000 presidential election itself, the split in Kuomintang votes between Soong and Lien led in part to the election of Chen Shui-bian. After the election, there was widespread anger within the Kuomintang against Lee Teng-hui, who was expelled and formed his own pro-Taiwan independence party, the Taiwan Solidarity Union. After Lee's expulsion, the Kuomintang moved its policies back to a more conservative one and began informal but close cooperation with the People First Party and the New Party. This coalition became informally known as the Pan-Blue Coalition. Although the members of the Pan-Blue Coalition maintain separate party structures, they closely cooperate in large part to ensure that electoral strategies are coordinated, so that votes are not split among them leading to a victory by the Pan-Green Coalition.The KMT and PFP ran a combined ticket in the 2004 presidential elections with Lien Chan running for president and James Soong running for vice president. The campaign emblem for the Lien-Soong campaign was a two seat bicycle with a blue (the color of the KMT) figure in the first seat and an orange (the color of the PFP) figure in the second.There were talks in late 2004 that the KMT and the PFP would merge into one party in 2005, but these talks have been put on hold. In the 2004 legislative election the three parties from the pan-blue coalition organized themselves to properly divide up the votes (配票) to prevent splitting the vote. The New Party ran all but one of its candidates under the KMT banner. The result was that the KMT gained 11 more seats and the PFP lost 12 seats. Right after the election, PFP chairman James Soong began criticizing the KMT for sacrificing the PFP for its own gains and stated that he would not participate in any negotiations regarding to the two parties' merge. Soong's remarks have been strongly criticized by the KMT, a majority of PFP members, and the New Party, whose rank and file were largely absorbed by the PFP following the 2001 elections. Nonetheless, shortly after the legislative election, the PFP legislative caucus agreed to cooperate with the DPP over the investigation into the KMT's finances. On February 24, 2005, James Soong met with President Chen for the first time in four years and issued a 10 point declaration supporting the name "Republic of China", the status quo in cross-Strait relations, and the opening of the Three Links. Unlike Soong, Lien did not respond to the offer from Chen to meet.However, after the 2005 Pan-Blue visits to mainland China, Soong and Chen stopped their partnership. The popular Taipei mayor Ma Ying-jeou was also elected the new head of the Kuomintang, and was considered the leading contender for the KMT nomination in the 2008 presidential election. However, it was uncertain whether the KMT and PFP could agree to field a common ticket. On the 2005 chairmanship election, Soong had made a televised endorsement of Ma's opponent Wang Jin-pyng.In the December 2005 3-in-1 local elections, the KMT made large gains and held
14 seats, the DPP suffered defeat and held only six, the PFP retained only one, and the TSU was completely shut out. This led the PFP to announce on December 12 that it would merge into the KMT in two phases, the first being completed by the end of January 2006. Ma Ying-jeou was now virtually assured of leading the KMT and pan-blues for the 2008 presidential election, but it is unclear as yet whether Soong will run as vice-president, although it seems likely.

Pan-Green Coalition, TheB5: 泛綠聯盟; GB: 泛绿联盟; PY: Fànlǜ LiánméngPan-Green Force, TheB5: 泛綠軍; GB: 泛绿军; PY: Fànlǜ Jūn- Informal political alliance in early 21st century Taiwan, consisting of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU), and the minor Taiwan Independence Party (TAIP). The name comes from the colors of the Democratic Progressive Party, which originally adopted green in part because of its association with the environmental movement. In contrast to the Pan-Blue Coalition, the Pan-Green Coalition tends to favor Taiwan independence over Chinese reunification, although members in both coalitions have moderated their policies to reach voters in the center.This strategy is helped by the fact that much of the motivation that voters have for voting for one party or the other are for reasons that have nothing to do with relations with Mainland China. This is particularly true among the swing voters. For much of the 1990s the parties which later form the Pan-Green Coalition greatly benefited from the perception that they were less corrupt than the ruling Kuomintang.The Pan-Green Coalition formed in the aftermath of the 2000 Taiwanese Presidential election, after which Lee Teng-hui was expelled from the Kuomintang and created his own party, the Taiwan Solidarity Union, which maintains a pro-independence platform.The internal dynamics of the Pan-Green Coalition are different from those of the Pan-Blue coalition. Unlike the Pan-Blue coalition, which consists of relatively equal-sized parties with very similar ideologies, the pan-green coalition contains the DPP, which is much larger and more moderate than the TSU. So rather than coordinating electoral strategies, as in the case of the parties within the Pan-Blue coalition, the presence of the TSU keeps the DPP from moving too far away from its Taiwan independence roots. In local elections competition tends to be fierce between Pan-Green candidates from different parties and as a rule, joint candidates are not proposed.The Green Party Taiwan is not part of the Pan-Green Coalition.

Pan-Purple Coalition, TheB5: 泛紫聯盟; PY: Fànzǐ LiánméngAlliance of Fairness and Justice (AFJ)B5: 公平正義聯盟- Social activist umbrella group based in the Republic of China on Taiwan. The coalition brings together nine social welfare organizations and promotes the causes of the underprivileged. It supports progressive taxation, a national social welfare system, education reforms, and gender and ethnic equality.Its name is a reference to the Pan-Blue Coalition and the Pan-Green Coalition, two political coalitions also based in Taiwan. The Pan-Purple Coalition has accused Pan-Blue and Pan-Green for causing ethnic rifts running along the issues of reunification and independence and has rejected overtures to join either group.

Member organizations

Peacetime Foundation of Taiwan (台灣和平促進文教基金會)

The Alliance for Handicapped People (殘障聯盟)

The National Teachers' Association (全國教師會)

The Alliance for Old People's Welfare Promotion (老人福利推動聯盟)

The Parents' Association for Persons with Intellectual Disabilities (智障者家長總會)

Revolt of The Three FeudatoriesB5: 三藩; PY: sān fàn- The three feudatories were territories in southern China bestowed by the early Manchu rulers on three Chinese generals (Wu Sangui, Geng Jingzhong, and Shang Zhixin). In the second half of the 17th century, these generals revolted against the Manchu Qing Dynasty. This rebellion came as the Qing rulers were establishing themselves after their conquest of China in 1644, and was the last serious threat to their imperium until the 19th century conflicts that ultimately brought about the end of the dynasty in 1912. The Revolt was followed by almost a decade of civil war which extended across the breadth of China.

In 1655, the Qing government granted Wu Sangui, a man to whom they were indebted for the conquest of China, both civil and military authority over the province of Yunnan. In 1662, after the execution of Zhu Youlang, the last Ming claimant to the throne, Wu was given jurisdiction also over Guizhou. In the next decade he consolidated his power and by 1670 his influence had spread to include much of Hunan, Sichuan, Gansu and even Shaanxi. Two other powerful defected military leaders also developed similar powers: Shang Zhixin in Guangdong and Geng Jingzhong in Fujian. They ruled their "feudatories" as their own domains and the Qing court had virtually no control over the provinces in the south and southwest.By 1672 the young Kangxi Emperor had determined that the feudatories were a threat to the Manchu regime. In 1673 Shang Zhixin submitted a memorial requesting permission to retire and in August of the same year a similar request arrived from Wu Sangui, designed to test the court's intentions. Kangxi went against the majority view in the Council of Princes and High Officials and accepted the request. News of Wu's rebellion reached Beijing in January 1674.

The same day, Zhu San taizi (朱三太子, heir prince of the Chongzhen Emperor), a fake one of course) a pretender to the Ming throne, led a revolt of several hundred household slaves at the capital. As chaos spread and a majority of the southern bureaucracy defected, the Kangxi Emperor hurriedly organized a pacification plan. He sent a vanguard at top speed to hold Jingzhou in the Middle Yangtze to press down Hunan and ordered the Xi'an garrison to move to Sichuan. At the end of the month, two staging areas had been established, one in Yanzhou, Shandong to handle logistics in eastern China and another at Taiyuan, Shaanxi, for Shaanxi, Sichuan and the southwest. Prince Lergiyen, son of the great Lekedehun and direct descendant of Nurhaci, was named commander-in-chief of the Qing armies.In early 1674 the Qing forces suffered a number of setbacks. Wu Sangui captured most areas south of the Yangtze and in the west pushed through Sichuan. In Gansu, General Wang Fuchen revolted and took Gansu and much of western Shaanxi into the rebel camp. Sun Yanling, who had ordered to hold Guangxi, also revolted, along with Geng Jingzhong's Fujian feudatory. Only Shang Zhixin in the far south remained loyal to the Qing.In the spring of 1675, the Mongol leader Burni revolted in Manchuria and led an army on Shenyang. A federation of Mongol tribes was coordinated by Mala, a director from the Court of Colonial Affairs, against Burni. An ad-hoc army under generals Oja and Tuhai was also sent against the northern threat. They managed to route Burni and he was killed by the Korchin Mongols.

Around the spring and early summer of 1675, the Kangxi Emperor became increasingly disillusioned with the performance of Manchu commanders. The pacification campaigns were bogged down in Zhejiang, Shaanxi and Ningxia. The third feudatory, Shang Zhixin, rebelled in Guangdong, and one of the Emperor's most vaunted generals, Chen Fu, was killed in a mutiny in Ningxia. Then, with startling suddenness, the course of the war turned. Without coherent administration and leadership, the rebels fragmented and fought among themselves. Wang Fuchen returned to Qing allegiance and his troops were used by Kangxi in western China. In November, Geng Jingzhong surrendered to General Giyesu in Fujian, and his troops were sent to Jiangxi. Shang Zhixin surrendered in January 1677, and later that year Wu Sangui had Sun Yanling murdered because it was believed he too was about to surrender. Thus, the only major threats remaining to the Qing forces were Wu Sangui himself in the southwest, and Zheng Jing, son of the Ming loyalist general Zheng Chenggong, who threatened the southwestern coastline from Taiwan.

The last four years of the war saw a steady series of Qing victories. Wu Sangui died of natural causes in 1678 and his grandson Wu Shifan committed suicide in Yunnan in December 1681. Zheng Jing was defeated near Xiamen (Amoy) in 1680 and forced to withdraw to Taiwan, dying there in 1681. Geng Jingzhong was sentenced to death by slicing and his head displayed in public. Many who surrendered in good faith in the belief that they would receive amnesty from the throne were likewise executed.The final victory to round off the wars of the three feudatories was the conquest of Taiwan. As soon as the war on the mainland was over, the Kangxi Emperor chose Shi Lang, a man who had been admiral to the Zheng family fleets during the early 1640s, to lead an amphibious operation against Taiwan. Shi Lang insisted on having independent command, from the Governor-General of Fujian, Yao Qisheng, and the Governor-General of Guangxi and Guangdong, Wu Xingzuo. He assembled a fleet of three hundred vessels and defeated the Zheng family's leading naval commander Liu Guoxuan on a major engagement near the Pescadores. A few weeks later, in October 1683, the last members of the Zheng family in Taiwan surrendered.The Kangxi Emperor had finally succeeded in securing his place on the throne and reunified the empire. He cemented this with policies to integrate members of the Chinese literate elite into the Qing state and to reduce the protracted bitterness of south China

Tungning, The Kingdom ofB5: 東寧王國; PY: Dōngníng Wángguó- First Han Chinese state to exist on Taiwan, between 1661 and 1683. The kingdom was founded as Tungtu / Dongdu by Koxinga, after the destruction of the Ming Dynasty by the Manchu Qing Dynasty. Koxinga was a former pirate who styled himself as a Ming Dynasty loyalist; he hoped to marshal his troops on Taiwan and use it as a base to regain Mainland China for the Ming Dynasty. The kingdom was renamed to Tungning / Dongning in 1664.

History

In 1661, Koxinga led his troops to a landing at Lu'ermen to attack Taiwan. By the end of the year, he had expelled the Dutch, who had controlled Taiwan for the past 38 years. Koxinga proceeded to devote himself to building Taiwan into an effective base for anti-Qing sympathizers who wanted to restore the Ming Dynasty to power.At the age of 39, Koxinga died of malaria, although speculations said that he died in a sudden fit of madness upon hearing the death of his father under the Qing. His son, Zheng Jing, succeeded him as the King of Taiwan.For the next nineteen years, Zheng Jing tried to provide sufficiently for the local inhabitants and reorganize their military forces in Taiwan. Contact with the Kangxi Emperor of the Qing Dynasty from the mainland through ambassadors was frequent. Under Qing pressure, Zheng Jing struggled to defend Xiamen, Quemoy and the Pescadores islands, which he had eventually lost over the years, mainly due to his minuscule forces which were insufficient to defend from the Qing. Zheng Jing committed suicide in 1681 in a battle with the Qing empire. His son, Zheng KeShuang, succeeded him.In 1683, Taiwan fell to Qing forces and was incorporated into the Qing Empire until 1895.

Legacy

The Kingdom of Tungning existed for just over 20 years, but due to its parallels to the current political status of Taiwan, it continues to hold great symbolic value.After its defeat in the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the Republic of China (ROC), led by the Kuomintang, retreated to Taiwan, leaving Mainland China to the newly established People's Republic of China (PRC). For the next several decades, the ROC was devoted to regaining the mainland, by maintaining island bases in close proximity to the mainland (e.g. Quemoy). Although the ROC has since democratized and is no longer singularly devoted to re- conquering the mainland, the political and territorial arrangement has remained unchanged. In this respect, there is a striking parallel between the Qing/Koxinga situation and the current PRC/ROC situation.The Kuomintang of the ROC have, unsurprisingly, focused on the goals of Koxinga, i.e. to use Taiwan as a base for restoring the rightful government to Mainland China. The PRC has generally focused on the fact that Koxinga (re)gained Taiwan for the fatherland from Dutch colonialism. Advocates of Taiwanese independence have, in turn, focused on the fact that the Kingdom of Tungning was the first independent Taiwanese state.

Twenty-One Demands, The- Set of demands which the Japanese government of Okuma Shigenobu sent to the Chinese government in January 18th, 1915, in which China gave into and had signed two treaties with Japan on May 25th.Despite China being on the side of the Allies in World War I, the Japanese demanded German spheres of influence be annexed to them. The government of Yuan Shi-kai prepared to sign the agreement, but when words leaked out to the world of this agreement, mass protests sprung up across China and threatened revolution if Yuan's government agreed to the demands. Western pressure forced Japan to abandon its ambitions.The demands caused a severe boycott movement of Japanese products in China.

Fort ZeelandiaB5: 熱蘭遮城; PY: rèlánzhē chéng- Fortress built over ten years from 1624–1634 by the Dutch Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, in the town of Anping (Tainan) on the island of Formosa, present day Taiwan, during their 38-year rule over the western part of it. Although the site has been previously named Orange City (奧倫治城), Anping City (安平城), and Tayoan City (台灣城), the current name of the site in Chinese is Fort Anping (安平古堡). The Dutch chose a sandy peninsula off the coast of Tainan as the site of the fortress since this would allow the fortress direct access to the sea and with it, supplies and reinforcements from Batavia in event of a siege. Unfortunately, the site chosen lacked adequate supplies of fresh water, which had to be shipped in from the mainland. The bricks used for the construction of the fortress were brought over from Java, and the mortar used consisted of a mixture of sugar, sand, ground seashells and glutinous rice. The fort was designed to be surrounded by three concentric layers of walls and the four corners of the fort were built into protruding bastions for better defence. On 30 April 1661, General Zheng Cheng Gong ("Koxinga") of Ming China (1368-1644) laid siege to the fortress (defended by 2,000 Dutch soldiers) with 400 warships and 25,000 men. After a nine-month siege with the loss of 1,600 Dutch lives, the Dutch surrendered the Fortress on 1 February 1662, when it became clear that no reinforcements were forthcoming from Batavia (Present day Jakarta, Java, Indonesia) and when the defenders ran short of fresh water. Under the peace treaty Koxinga-Dutch Treaty (1662) signed on 1 February 1662 between Koxinga and Frederick Coyett, the Dutch governor, the Dutch surrendered the Fortress and left all the goods and property of the VOC behind at Fort Zeelandia. In return, all officials, soldiers and civilians were free to leave with their personal belongings and supplies. On 9 February 1662, Frederick Coyett handed over the keys to the fort and lead the remaining Dutch forces and civilians back to Batavia by sea, ending 38 years of Dutch colonial rule on Taiwan.